Stansted Airport is the fourth busiest UK airport, but it is a major hub for Europe’s major vacation-oriented carrier, Ryanair. Ryanair offers more than 100 routes. RyanAir serves many European destinations including Barcelona, Berlin, Bologna, Bremen, Budapest, Frankfurt, Madrid, Rome, Salzburg, Genoa, Stockholm, Warsaw, Wroclaw and Valencia. It also offers flights to numerous European, Canary Island, and Middle Eastern beach destinations. In addition to its popular Dublin flight, it also offers service to Kerry, Cork, Derry, and Shannon. RyanAir international flights uses gates 40 through 59. National flights use the domestic gates.

EasyJet is the second major carrier at Stansted. It offers European routes including Amsterdam, Bilbao, Copenhagen, Lyon, Munich, Naples, Prague, and Nice. Within the UK, it offers flights to Belfast, Ireland; Edinburgh, Scotland; and Glasgow, Scotland. It also flies to Turkish and Middle Eastern vacation destinations such as Sharm el Sheik and Marrakech. It offers seasonal flights to Dalaman, Dubronik, Ibiza, Split, Geneva, and Bodrum.

Air Berlin offers regular flights to Dusseldorf, Germany. In addition, Germanwings offers flights to Hanover, Stuttgart, and Cologne/Bonn.Austrian Airlines offers seasonal flights to Innsbruck. Belle Air offers flights to Tirana and Pristina. Aurigny Air Services offers flights to Guernsey and Jersey. Pegasus Air offers flights to Istanbul and Izmir as well as seasonal flights to Bodrum.

With more than 300,000 travelers per route, these cities top the destination list for Stansted: Malaga, Rome, Milan, Amsterdam, and Palma de Mallorca. With more than 200,000 travelers per route every year, these cities are also major destinations: Faro, Pisa, Frankfurt, Stockholm, Krakow, Riga, Madrid, Bratislava, Berlin, Cork, Billund, Ibiza, Gothernburg, Eindhovern and Porto. By far the major destination of choice, however, is Dublin, Ireland, with 750,000 travelers per year.

Other airlines and/or charters include Thomas Cook Airlines, Titan Airways, Thomson Airways, and Travel Service Airlines. Thomson Airways flies to more than 18 destinations. These include beach destinations in the Spanish Canary Islands as well as European vacation spots such as snowy Innsbruck and Salzburg and sunny Turin and Zakynthos. Titan flies to sunny spots such as Dalaman and Figari as well as Lourdes and Grenoble. Thomas Cook Airlines flies to Middle Eastern hot spots and the Spanish Canary Islands.